Nineteen Rings
by Lady Lark
Summary: Sai and Hikaru were not the only ones who had a story to tell. This is the story of the ill-fated tree who became the haunted goban.


_Disclaimer: Hikaru no Go was created by Hotta and Obata and distributed by a lot of people not me. This is a fanwork by a fan for fans no money was made off of the creation of this work._

**Nineteen Rings**  
_**By Lady Lark**_

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**Ring One**

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He was born in the forests near Heian-Kyu in the early spring. Pushing his way from the cold ground toward the inviting warmth of the sun, he took his first breaths in wonder. The world felt so strange and new and full of promise. He stretched his needles toward the sun and willed himself to grow.

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**Ring Two**

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_-CRACK!-_

A sharp sting from his right side awakened him from his winter slumber.

What was going on?

_-CRACK!-_

The pain returned. Intensified.

_-CRACK!-_

He stretched out with his consciousness to try to find the source of his pain. He felt the sap struggling sluggishly to race to the wound to try to start the healing process to no avail. This was no branch breaking from a winter storm or errant tanuki. This was something more deliberate. And deadly.

_-CRACK!-_

He found the culprit, or rather culprits. Two of the creatures that walked on their hind legs and always faintly of fire and decay were each swinging something that glinted in the cold winter sun. Each time the weapon struck, the gash in his side was opened wider.

_-CRACK!-_

He wondered faintly what he had done to provoke an attack this brutal. He could think of nothing. He'd lived his life peacefully drinking in the sun, air, earth, and rain in equal measure. He had never encroached on the lands that the creatures had staked out as their own. He'd never been that desperate.

_-CRACK!-_

He felt weak. Dizzy. And very unstable. A few more hits with those shiny weapons of theirs and he'd collapse. He wished there was something he could do to make them stop. To dissuade them from their murderous actions. He wasn't ready to die. Four hundred years was not enough.

_-CRACK!-_

He sent that last thought out desperately, hoping that he'd be heard and someone, somewhere, would answer his plea.

_-CRACK!-_

Someone did.

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**Ring Three**

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He awoke in darkness. The air was still with no hint of a breeze. He tried to feel the sun, the earth, the rain and found nothing. Something was wrapped around him, smothering him. He tried to move or do something to get the covering off but met with no success. He was trapped.

With no way of escape presenting itself and with no means to gauge the passage of time, he was left with nothing but his own thoughts. He had never been a thinker. Like many of the other trees in the forest, he lived in the moment, thinking little of the future or the past. Now, with nothing else to do, he had time to think and to feel.

He discovered quickly during his initial incarceration that he was no longer the magnificent giant he'd once been. His consciousness was confined to a small square piece of his former body. He wasn't sure how he'd managed to cheat death or if he even had. In time, he realized he could sense other parts of his trunk scattered about the same dark place where he was held. Unlike the piece he resided in, the other pieces felt devoid of any consciousness. They were dead.

Which made him wonder even more if he were even alive.

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**Ring Four**

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He could not state with any certainty how many settings of the sun had passed from the time he was felled until he felt the sun's rays on him once again. Too many was all he knew.

As the creatures removed the wrappings that had bound him and his other parts he could hear exclamations of sadness and disappointment.

"This one's cracked."

"This one too!"

"This one's moldy!"

The creature who had removed his bindings bent over and rubbed one rough forepaw over his surface. The touch was soft, almost imperceptible. But after the length of his solitary confinement, he welcomed the sensation. He felt himself being lifted up and the same soft touch was repeated on his other side.

The creature lowered him to the ground and called out, "This one's perfect!"

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**Ring Five**

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After the creature's exclamation, the block of wood was lifted up and taken into another dim confine. Not as dark as his last prison, but it was not the sun-dappled shade of his forest. There, another creature examined him, running his gnarled and knobby forepaw over the former tree's exposed surfaces. The gnarled one motioned for the creatures who had transported him to this new place to place him on the ground under a small beam of sun.

The creature clucked and chattered like one of the squirrels that occasionally used to visit his branches and he wondered, for a moment, if these creatures who had felled him and kept him confined in the dark were some kind of overgrown squirrel. It was possible. There were striking similarities.

The creature brought out a few items that glinted in the sunlight. Once again, the creature ran his forepaw over him. "You were once a magnificent tree," the old creature whispered. "We shall make you beautiful again."

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**Ring Six**

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Over the next thirteen moons, the old man, the creatures were called men he learned, worked on him. The man took his time, often sitting quietly over him for hours at a time before setting metal to wood. As the man worked, he talked to the former tree and so the tree learned. He learned that he was a special kind of tree known as Kaya and that he was being fashioned into a goban as a gift from a wife to her husband.

From the tones in which the old man spoke, the former tree could tell that the wife and her husband were revered and very powerful. He wasn't sure exactly was that meant other than he was chopped down in order to make this gift. He mostly spent the time learning about his new life and expanding his awareness of the world around him.

Finally, after one last wipe with a cloth the man sat back on his heels and regarded him. "You are finished, my friend. It is time for you to meet the Empress."

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**Ring Seven**

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He didn't meet the Empress right away. Instead he was carried on the backs of several men for many miles. He saw many other trees like him along the way and could feel them delighting in the wind whistling through their branches, the sun overhead, the dew collected on their needles, the earth beneath their roots. He wished that these trees, these Kaya, would never know the pain of metal against their trunks but the speculative glances several of the men shot at the trees told him that his wish was unlikely to be granted.

After seven dawnings of the sun, they reached a large conglomeration of structures. Buildings he remembered them being called, full of more of the man creatures. The men carried him through a path around many of the buildings to a larger and more ornate one.

Here, the lead man told another strangely garbed man that he was here with the Empress' special order. The strangely garbed man inspected the small troupe and their cargo with a grunt and motioned for them to go through a small door.

Here the group waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Finally, after several hours, a young woman entered escorted by several men.

"Your Imperial Majesty," the men said and fell to the floor in a low bow.

The woman surveyed them all for a moment then let out a snort. "You think that a bunch of peasants like you are fit to be seen by Chuuguu-sama? Don't be absurd."

The men sat back up onto their heels. "Who are you, then?" the leader asked.

"I am one of her servants. She has instructed me to verify that the goban in question is of high enough quality then, assuming it is, I will inform her and bring you the agreed upon payment. However, if it is not of high enough quality..." she trailed off, letting her tone speak to the consequences. Behind her, the men who accompanied her took a menacing step forward.

The man carrying the goban scrambled to lower him to the ground and undo his protective coverings.

The woman waved him away and finished unwrapping him herself. She ran one hand over his top and sides and then bent down to inspect the grain. She made little disapproving clucking noises with her tongue as she inspected him.

Finally, she stood back up. "The work is adequate, but barely," she announced. "I will inform her Imperial Majesty." She motioned for the guards to bring him with her as she exited the room.

There were protests from the men who'd carried him here that were silenced by a look from one of the guards.

He was carried out of the building and across a sterile and manicured courtyard to a large structure. There, the woman had the guards place him inside an ornately decorated room with a raised dais. Then the woman left for a few minutes.

When she returned, she was accompanied by two women with long floor-length hair and elaborate clothing. The younger of the two knelt down and ran a slim hand over him. "You were right, Chiyo, it is perfect. My lord will be pleased."

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**Ring Eight**

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He was presented to the Emperor later that week.

He was brought forward and placed before a stern man in elaborate crimson robes.

The young woman who he learned was the Empress knelt before him, requesting permission to speak. After only a few seconds, the man gave a small grunt, indicating he was willing to hear her speak.

The woman sat up, but remained kneeling during her carefully prepared speech. "My Lord Husband, as thanks for all of the gifts you have given me over the last five years of our marriage. I would like to present you with this goban," she said indicating the goban. "I know it is not as magnificent as the one you lost a year ago when the palace burned. But I hope, in some small way, this gift will ease the loss." She paused to gauge the Emperor's reaction, a small smile. Visibly encouraged, she continued. "I also have taken the liberty of engaging my cousin, Fujiwara no Sai, as an instructor for my Lord Husband so that he might have someone to play with who is of some skill, since I am, as you have so often pointed out, a poor player of Go."

At her words, a young man with long hair and white robes stepped forward. The man must be Fujiwara no Sai that the Empress mentioned.

The Emperor stood and came over to his wife's side. "It is a fine gift, my wife. I thank you for your thoughtfulness."

The woman smiled demurely, but her eyes were triumphant. "I live but to serve, my lord husband."

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**Ring Nine**

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For the next four years, Fujiwara no Sai and the Emperor played a strange game of placing white and black stones on him. They often commented on his fine grain and subtle pattern under the grid etched on his surface.

He never knew if the men who'd chopped him down, kept him in the dark, fashioned him into a goban, and then carried him here were ever paid. He frankly didn't care.

He was often out in the sun in the gardens of another complex of buildings. And there, in the warmth of the sun with Fujiwara no Sai and the Emperor playing their strange game on him could he feel the wind, hear the water, and smell the earth.

It was as close as he got to home.

It was not to last.

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**Ring Ten**

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The destruction of his new found happiness came in the form of another man, another Go instructor who was jealous of the attention paid to this younger, newer instructor. He challenged Fujiwara no Sai to a duel, a game, and through deceit and trickery caused the younger man to lose.

With this loss and subsequent disgrace, Fujiwara no Sai was banished from both the Emperor's and Empress' courts. On his last day at the palace, Fujiwara no Sai came to say goodbye.

"I will miss you," he whispered brokenly. "You have given me so many happy memories but I cannot forget the most recent one. If only I were better, stronger. I could have defeated that man, despite his treachery." A few tears slipped out from between Fujiwara no Sai's lashes and fell on his surface. With one long sleeve, the former Go instructor wiped the dampness away. "I'm sorry. I should be more polite. It's just..." he trailed off and looked around the darkened room. "I'm just not ready to go."

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**Ring Eleven**

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After Fujiwara no Sai's defeat and disgrace. He was packed away into a storeroom for a long while. When he was taken out, he found that the Emperor had died and the Empress had become a nun. He was still a fine goban, so many ministers and other dignitaries used him and played that strange game on him.

But it wasn't the same.

More often than not, he'd be hidden in a storeroom or box for years only to be taken out, exclaimed over and passed on. If he was lucky, his discoverer would play a few games on him in the sunshine. But most of the time, he would be immediately boxed up again and shunted to a different storeroom in a different town. As the years marched forward, he ended up in progressively smaller and smaller towns until he ended up on the small island of Innoshima. There, he was found by a small boy playing in one of his father's storerooms.

The boy's name: Kuwabara Torajiro.

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**Ring Twelve**

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"Where did you find that?" the boy's father asked a few days later.

Kuwabara Torajiro looked up from polishing the goban. "In your warehouse, father," he replied respectfully before going back to his task. It felt good to finally be cleaned and oiled after being neglected for so long.

The older man frowned. "I didn't know we had a go board in storage. Which warehouse?"

Not looking up from the board, the boy answered, "The one you store most of what you call 'junk' in."

"Ah," the father said with a nod. "I must have picked it up at the last estate sale I attended. I didn't know there was such a treasure in there." He patted the boy on the head. "Good job, Torajiro. I should be able to fetch a good price for this."

Torajiro frowned. "Do we have to sell it?" he asked plaintively. "I'd like to keep it."

His father frowned again. "It's worth a lot of money. Money that could buy you a good apprenticeship or education. Perhaps even enough to buy your way into the daimyo's court."

"But you don't need to buy my way in," the boy blurted out.

"Of course I do, why else would the court allow someone of non-noble descent to join its ranks if not for money?" He thwacked the boy on the head. "Don't you know anything?"

Rising to his feet, the boy placed himself between the goban and his father. "You won't need to buy my way in, because I'll be invited!"

"And why would they invite you?" the father sneered.

"Because I'm going to be the best go player there is!"

The older man snorted. "Ha! How do you plan to do that? You've never played."

Torajiro tilted his head to one side and regarded his father coolly. "I propose a wager. A game. If I win, you let me keep this go board and allow me to become a student at the local monastery. If I lose, I will allow you to sell the goban and follow any path you desire of me with no questions."

"Hmph! You think you can beat me? Why I played against Hoshin once!"

"Then you clearly have the advantage," Torajiro responded. "Do you agree to the wager?"

"I do!"

The two drew to see who would play first and the boy won. A few moves in and the goban felt an eerie sense of familiarity with the play. It reminded him of Fujiwara no Sai's games. The longer the game went on, the more the feeling grew. If he didn't know better, he would think that the boy was Sai reborn but that somehow didn't seem possible.

He focused his senses, ignoring the distractions of the wind and the sun and concentrated on the boy. Or rather the area around the boy. He didn't have eyes or ears, like a human, but he could just barely make out the form of a white robed figure whispering into the boy's ear.

Fujiwara no Sai.

The boy's father didn't stand a chance.

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**Ring Thirteen**

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Kuwabara Torajiro won his wager and in less than a month played against the Daimyo, Lord Asano. Again he won. Impressing the daimyo and his teacher, the monk Hoshin, so much that the monk demanded to teach the boy. Unsurprisingly, there wasn't much to teach. So in less than a year's time, Torajiro and the goban were bundled off to the Honinbo School in Edo.

It was an exciting time. The goban was happy to be out in the sun once more. The times had changed, he noted. The air was different, less fresh, than he remembered. But the sun was still warm and the wind still caressed him so it was good.

He discovered that much like himself, Fujiwara no Sai was not ready to move on to the next life. But unlike him, it wasn't because he wasn't ready to die, but because Sai didn't want to stop playing go.

Even as spirits, these humans were odd.

Still, he appreciated Torajiro allowing Sai to possess him because it meant that the goban could once again be out in the world he so loved.

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**Ring Fourteen**

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For over twenty-five years the three of them played go. For over twenty-five years the goban was happy and content. He learned to love this new world and Torajiro was very kind to him, caring for him like a mother cared for her child.

Everything was wonderful until the sickness came.

Cholera they called it.

It swept through Edo felling young and old alike. I reminded the former tree of a flood tearing away part of the countryside. It was so virulent and deadly.

When the first elder of the Honinbo School fell ill, Torajiro was the first to volunteer to care for him. One by one, the members of the Honinbo house became sick and Torajiro was always the first to care for the sick and dying.

Until he fell ill himself. It came upon him suddenly, while he was caring for the Goban. He tried to stop the vomiting, biting his tongue in the process, with no luck. He collapsed against the goban.

When Torajiro came to a while later, he was mortified by what had occurred. He cleaned up the bloody mess apologetically before collapsing once more from dehydration. A maid found him a few hours later.

With so many ill, there was no one willing or able to care for the kind, young man.

He died, alone, with no one to mourn his passing other than the ghost of Fujiwara no Sai and his faithful goban.

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**Ring Fifteen**

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He remained at the Honinbo school after Torajiro's death until the school closed its doors almost eighty years later. To pay for the debts that the school accrued, all of its assets were sold, including the goban. He was sold to a young man, and former student of the school who was about to leave for pilot training for the Imperial Navy, Shindou Takashi.

The goban was a gift to his eight-year old son, Heihachi.

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**Ring Sixteen**

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For the duration of the war, Heihachi played Go almost obsessively. He challenged old men in the park, inviting them back to his home for tea and a game. It was the only bright point of the war for the goban.

Because of shortages, he was unable to be cared for as well as he should have been and even worse, he'd been left out over night in the rain when an air raid siren went off. Heihachi did his best to care for the aging goban, but he was limited to what he hand on hand.

But after his father died in a divine wind, Heihachi didn't even try any more. He packaged up the goban and placed him in a box in the shed.

He never looked at the goban again.

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**Ring Seventeen**

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The voices of children roused him back into consciousness. It was rare that someone actually entered the shed. Children were rarer still.

"Are you sure we can do this?" one of the voices, a girl he thought, asked.

"I don't have a choice," the other replied. "I only got eight points on my history exam and my parents cut off my allowance." The speaker, a boy from the tone, moved aside some of the items surrounding him and said, "This could work."

The boy lifted him out of the box and set him down on the floor of the shed. The air was cold and damp and he could hear the sound of the rain beating down against the roof tiles. The two children cleaned the dust of many decades off of him with an old rag. He reveled in finally being clean after over fifty years.

"Why isn't this stain coming out?" the boy asked after several moments.

Stain? What stain? None of his previous owners had mentioned a stain.

The girl seemed to agree with him. "What stain? There isn't any stain. It's pretty."

The boy jabbed his finger at the imaginary mark. "It's right here!"

"Where? I don't see anything!" the girl's voice took on a scared tremor.

"What do you mean you don't see anything? It's right there!"

The air around the shed became charged with some kind of energy and a voice he hadn't heard in over a hundred and thirty years spoke, "Can you see it? Can you hear my voice? You can hear my voice, can't you?"

Fujiwara no Sai had found a new host.

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**Ring Eighteen**

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They left him alone in the attic of the shed, not even bothering to put him back in the box he'd been in. For that he was grateful. Even if he couldn't be out in the world. He could at least see the sun through the windows and watch the dust swirl around in the sunbeams. He wondered if Fujiwara no Sai's new host would come and get him.

He sat there for a little over three years when he was visited by Fujiwara no Sai and his host. The ghost looked sad but also content. As if he'd come to terms with himself. Something must have happened.

The goban wondered what.

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**Ring Nineteen**

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"The stains are gone," the voice of the new host startled him out of his reverie.

He'd been watching the birds flying back and forth outside of the window gathering materials for their nest. He regarded the young man critically. The boy seemed afraid and Fujiwara no Sai's presence was gone.

The goban immediately surmised that the ghost had moved on that he'd completed whatever quest he'd been on that had kept him around for almost a thousand years.

The board envied him.

Even after fourteen hundred years, he still wasn't ready to die.

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**AN**:

Beta read by Penguingirl03.

Written as part of Blind Go in September 2013. Yeah, I chose to write from the POV of the goban. I'm odd.

I hope you enjoyed!


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